How Al Feels
by Stariceling
Summary: Senses translate differently when your body is suddenly made of metal. Al remembers his own sense of touch, but even now he can't quite grasp the feeling.


Note: I gain nothing in the way of matterial or monetary compensation from playing with these characters, nor do I claim they belong to me. Basic disclaimery stuff and all.

Hello and welcome to the fic. If you are looking for yaoi or Elricest you have found the wrong page. This is simple exploration of an idea with a touch of brotherly love between the Elrics on the side. I shall be your author for the moment, so please relax and enjoy.

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Al could not feel. At least, not in the literal meaning of the word. 

He was aware of the armor he was bound to, in the same way he would have been aware of the position of his own body, but that was the extent of it. He felt no heat, no cold, and no pain. It was uncomfortable if he lost his head, or a limb, but only on a mental level. Knowing that a part of his own body was missing or distorted bothered him, but in more or less the same way that he knew it bothered other people to see it.

Al was accustomed to the armor now, to not feeling pain or touch. At least he remembered what it felt like to touch. At least the armor he was in made a complete body. It was a useful body, and it allowed him to continue to live alongside he brother. Al couldn't ask for more, he didn't want to ask for more.

Taste and smell Al managed not to miss, he didn't need to eat in this body anyway. His hearing, as far as he could tell, endured. He was sure the world should be more picturesque than what he saw, with more clarity and less grey, but he had convinced himself that memories could be brighter simply because they were memories. It was only touch that he couldn't quite help missing.

Still, Al wasn't bitter about his complete loss of the texture and temperature of the world. He did his best to compensate. He had developed almost a sixth sense. He was aware of people nearby, as if he could feel their body heat. It wasn't really heat, not as he had known it. It was a sort of pressure they exerted on his mind, if not his body.

Al was especially aware of when things got lodged inside of the armor. Sand and stone, and other detritus, were distracting but easily removed. Strangers made him uneasy when their hearts, minds, souls, or whatever it was, suddenly shared such a small space with him, but being friendly by nature, Al didn't let those strangers stay strangers for very long. It was much easier housing a friend than someone he didn't know or trust.

His brother never made him uneasy or uncomfortable, even thought his presence was always the strongest. That made perfect sense to Al, since Ed was not only his kin, but the one person he loved and trusted most.

Al remembered Ed falling asleep on top of him when they were young, back when they first started studying alchemy at home and kept themselves up half the night with books. He had always fallen asleep a few minutes or hours before his brother, with the consequence that he would wake to find he had become Ed's substitute pillow.

Then he had been annoyed because his brother was so heavy, and it had been too hot squished under him. Just barely, he could remember how his brother's hair had felt fanned out on his arm or the back of his neck, so that it tickled when he moved. He had always poked Ed awake to complain.

Now Al thought the first thing he would do if. . . when, he got his human body back would be to give his brother a big hug and never let go. He wanted to taste and smell again, to feel wood and water and wind again, but more than anything he wanted to be near his warm, wonderful brother. Ed would be welcome to use him as a pillow any time, he would certainly never complain about how heavy he was again.

He would never complain about heat, either. It bothered him to see his brother shivering in the rain when he couldn't feel the chill himself.

Rain kept dripping down his front, making him think uncomfortably of rust, but he was not cold at all. Al only hoped that his brother wasn't freezing curled inside of his metal body. He was not exactly waterproof, and he didn't have any body heat to share, but at least he could get his brother out of the wind. He could feel how tightly his brother was curled up inside of him, and waited for him to start shivering.

At first Ed had refused to take shelter at all. He had insisted that he didn't want any sort of shelter while his little brother was out in the wet, though he knew Al wouldn't be chilled by the rain and wind. That was simply not the sort of thing a responsible big brother should do. Ed took the year difference between them seriously when he had a choice.

Al had finally pointed out that he didn't take up much room, so his brother could probably still fit inside the armor with him. It was nonsense, and he had felt silly as soon as he said it. He would have completely regretted saying it if it hadn't actually gotten Ed to come in out of the rain.

Sometimes Al wished he could get Ed to think of him as being someone inside of the armor, the way other people seemed to see him. He would have liked to give his brother the feeling that he already had a body, one that just happened to be hidden from view. He was sure Ed thought of him being sealed to the armor, or even as the armor itself. Well, it was impossible for his brother to pretend that Al had a body while he was actually inside the armor, seeing just how empty it really was.

Now there was little left for them but waiting. Waiting for the train to appear. Waiting for the rain to stop. Thinking about feeling, and feeling his brother right next to him. Ed's presence was comfortable, exerting a faint pressure on his mind that Al stubbornly chose to interpret as warmth.

"You've got a scratch here." his brother's voice echoed around inside of him in a way that made Al want to laugh.

There was a clap that Al both felt and heard, the a flash of alchemy as Ed smoothed over a nick on the inside of his neck. They always took care of one another this way. Ed would smooth over scars in Al's armor, while Al would bandage his brother's wounds. They might not be able to do major repairs themselves, but they managed together as best they could.

Al felt his brother rest his head on the inside of his back, beside the blood seal but not in any danger of touching it. When he moved Al was aware of his damp bangs splayed out against the metal, if only because he could imagine it instead of feeling it properly.

"Niisan, that tickles," Al said. Even though it didn't, only because it should.

Ed smiled at that. Al felt it.


End file.
